


Falling To Earth

by Littlebiscuits



Category: Far Cry 5
Genre: Alternate Universe, Choices, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-21
Updated: 2018-11-21
Packaged: 2019-08-27 01:00:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,817
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16692367
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Littlebiscuits/pseuds/Littlebiscuits
Summary: Rook makes a different choice, sends his life in a different direction.





	Falling To Earth

Rook knows why he's here.

It's not because he's impressed anyone, though Rook doesn't have to try overly hard to be noticed. It's not because he knows procedure back to front, he's only a few months into the job, and more often than not he's still sent out with Hudson or Pratt as back-up. There are other deputies that the Sheriff could have taken, more experienced, better able to 'feel out a situation' as Whitehorse likes to say.

The Sheriff would probably say he'd taken Rook along because he's calm in a crisis, because he can follow orders, adapt to the unexpected. That would be a lie, though Rook doesn't fault him for it. The Sheriff takes him because he's a head taller than Burke, the Sheriff takes him because he can pin a man with one hand, and take a solid hit without going down. He takes Rook because of what he is, not because of what he knows. Rook thinks that Whitehorse is expecting trouble. He's expecting this to go badly, and he wants Rook there for show. 

Rook had known all of that, and he'd thought about pointing out that he wasn't bulletproof, that he wasn't indestructible, but instead Rook had said nothing, he'd just calmly loaded up and headed out to the helicopter with them.

Eden's Gate believes that the world is sliding towards some great collapse. They don't say how it's going to happen, maybe Joseph's Seed's prophecies don't tell him that, maybe he's supposed to set the whole thing off himself. But they think it's going to be soon, and they're clawing up everything they think they'll need on the other side, fast enough for the whole county to notice now, like they've seen the weather change, watched the clouds roll in, dark and heavy.

Though Rook's not sure how they're planning to survive the end times.

Joseph Seed isn't what Rook was expecting. He's only ever seen photographs, and the video that made it out of the compound, showing the tense, angry sermon, the man dragged from the crowd and punished - murdered - by Joseph, in full view of the camera. Rook is expecting a showman, he's expecting the stitched together pomposity of a religious leader, the selfish greed that cares nothing for the members of his 'church.'

Instead, instead what he finds in that dark church, is a man who looks, for all the world, like a true believer. Joseph's whole body is sharp with it, punishment driven into the skin and bones of him, as if to remind him. His voice is slow and hard, but clear enough to carry, punched out hard enough to touch him. There's a strange tension underneath every slow gesture, something protective and furious and barely contained. A mutilated saint holding back the fury of the world, ready to gather his flock in and bleed for them personally. Though Rook thinks Joseph's equally likely to dig his nails in until he feels blood, to demand that loyalty turns to violence, to consider it necessary for his cause. Rook vaguely registers Joseph's siblings, drifting in the darkness behind him, photographs brought to life. But none as starkly as Joseph himself.

Rook's momentum carries him almost all the way to the steps, passing bearded figures, armed and impatient, that look up as he passes, all quiet threat and displeasure. Rook can feel how unwanted he is here, how much they want them all gone, and he knows if Joseph asked them to, that these people would try their best to tear them to pieces.

Joseph doesn't look at the Marshal, waving his warrant like it somehow has the power to protect him from this room full of dark-eyed fanatics. He doesn't look at the Sheriff, who looks like he'd rather be anywhere else. Or at Hudson, who looks ready to start shooting the moment anyone asks. Joseph Seed looks at Rook, eyes lifted, focused, accusing and questioning at the same time.

Rook's not sure but he thinks he's just been accused of being a Horseman of the Apocalypse.

"God will not let you take me," Joseph says, with the assurance of a man who truly believes it. The assurance of a man who's already seen hell, and has nothing left to fear.

But Joseph doesn't protest, he doesn't fight him. Joseph lifts his hands and dares Rook to cuff him, eyes never leaving his face. As if everything that's going to happen is meant to, unstoppable, inevitable. Rook takes Joseph's warm, thin wrists and carefully cuffs them, and it's only the third time that Rook has ever put cuffs on anyone. 

It's a slow walk back to the helicopter, with the Sheriff, Burke, and Hudson, spread apart ahead of him like they're trying to appear more than they are. Rook is taking small, slow steps to keep the pace, one long hand curved over Joseph's shoulder. He can feel him through his glove, the flex of muscle, the jagged memory of sins drawn on his skin, around tattoos that say more than the man himself. Rook watches the others over the top of Joseph's head, tries not to grip tight when the Sheriff urges him to hurry, when the shivery edges of violence close tighter and tighter around them.

But Joseph is serene when they load him, humming to himself, preparing in some way, and Rook thinks that the clouds have finally rolled in, broken, thunder all around.

No one gets into the helicopter after them, that's what Rook is for. He's there to push back on the figures that swarm, and pull, and cry desperately for them to give Joseph back. Rook stops them all, breaks them free, grips and pushes and sends Joseph's followers screaming back to earth. A loyalty people would die for, and Rook doesn't know whether that's fanaticism, or love, or certainty that Joseph is the only one who can save them all.

Joseph watches Rook like he knows him, all bare skin and certainty, history full of pain and Rook knows that without looking, without reading a file. Rook thinks about obedience, he thinks about rules, and the way the world turns, over and over, crushing anything that isn't the same, anything that doesn't work quite right, beneath itself. He thinks about fairness, and honesty, and loyalty, and the way people hold them up as ideals, only to betray them when they mattered most of all. Only for everything to play out the same every time.

And then there's a body in the rotors, a person cut to ribbons, too late, they're too high, they're too far up. The helicopter loses powers, spirals in a slow death, and finally drops.

It's like the whole world has rolled the dice.

Rook makes a choice.

He pushes himself across the seat, one hand catching for the loop above him, ignoring the screaming, the grating sputter of metal failing in its purpose. He hauls Joseph's narrow weight out of the seat, and into his body, bending the bulk of himself over and around him. And in the madness of freefall he feels Joseph's cuffed hands lift to grasp his neck, where he has his head tucked down, the last murmured words of a song turned into his cheek.

Before Joseph grips him tightly -

The whole world is sound and fury and pain.

Something is burning in the blurred darkness.

Rook hears the grating, popping creak of metal twisted to breaking point and beyond. There's a weight on top of him, warm, shifting slowly, hands on his face and in his hair, murmuring his name. Demanding that he wake up.

He's the wrong way, there's too much of him - he unfolds, breaks open, sting of something punched in that shouldn't be there. The hands are still on him, warm and new, and he's sprawled awkwardly on his back, helicopter too small to contain him, seats broken. Something smells like it's on fire. 

It might be him.

And then the world is right again, and Rook is blinking blood out of his eyes, shoving at bent metal and helping Joseph out of the helicopter, finding his keys, drawing Joseph's hands into his own for the second time, unlocking the cuffs he'd laid there.

Rook can hear the Marshal shouting somewhere behind him, and someone else is spitting hard, painful noises. They sound very far away, drifting further on every word, and Rook thinks someone is taking them. He doesn't know what happens now, doesn't know how this ends, he just knows that it won't be stopped, that Joseph cannot be taken, he's not supposed to be. Though Rook would not have described himself as someone who believed things like that, not before today. It's like the world has turned over, shown him to be someone different. It's like Rook has been allowed to see the ruin that's waiting for them, if the world does nothing.

But he tries to speak anyway, tries to explain.

"I don't know -"

Joseph curls close and shushes him, strokes hands down his face, before cupping it and tilting it down to look at him.

"You saw, didn't you? You saw what had to be done, and you made a choice." Joseph is so close, eyes unnaturally wide behind cracked glasses, all reflections of fire and darkness. "God sent you to us. God sent you to _me_ , a shield against the harm that they would do to me, and to my family. You were meant to be here, that is your purpose, and I will help you understand that."

It feels like cruelty and madness, and it is, Rook can see that well enough. But maybe that's how they survive. To break what needs to be broken, to pull people kicking and screaming to something like sense, to something like a future. To make them see it, no matter how much it hurts. All the parts of his life, quiet, and empty, and dutiful, splinter behind him, and all that's left is Joseph, and his certainty, his quiet, determined need. 

Rook's hands have lifted before he registers where they're going, fingers on the bare, chilled skin of Joseph's waist, touching and then holding, and he's not sure whether that's to steady himself or to stop Joseph from moving away. 

The Peggies around him shift in surprised, uncertain silence, as if Rook has done something unexpected, something blasphemous, dared too much. But Joseph doesn't stop him, he just closes his eyes and sighs, like Rook is more than he could have hoped for.

"My last Herald," he murmurs.

The last Horseman, Rook thinks to himself. But he lets Joseph pull him in, accept him without question or doubt. And then Rook offers a hand, so Joseph can climb up onto a car and gather his followers in.

Because this is Rook's cause now.

And God help anyone who tries to stop him.


End file.
